around her. No one knew what to say. The relatives who had arrived ready to witness her collapse now avoided her eyes. Peter muttered something about misunderstandings. Celeste began crying in earnest, but Camille could not tell whether it was shame or disappointment.
Drew approached last.
‘I didn’t know about the clinic letter,’ he said.
Camille believed him. She also remembered the silver sedan outside her apartment.
‘But you followed me.’
Drew swallowed. ‘Mom said you were meeting with people trying to sell the marina out from under us.’
‘I was meeting with a lawyer.’
His face reddened.
Camille waited for an apology. Not because it would fix anything, but because she wanted to know whether anyone in the family could still name harm when they saw it.
Drew looked toward the hallway where Helena had disappeared. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said finally.
It was not enough.
But it was something.
Outside the hearing room, Marisol stood near a vending machine, arms folded tightly. Mr. Sutter waited a few steps away, pretending not to listen.
Camille walked to Marisol. ‘Thank you for coming.’
Marisol gave a shaky laugh. ‘I almost didn’t. I sat in my car for twenty minutes thinking about driving away.’
‘Why didn’t you?’
Marisol reached into her coat pocket and pulled out a small brass key. A strip of blue thread was tied around it.
Camille stared at the thread.
It was the exact color of the scarf her mother had worn in the last photograph Camille owned. Her mother on the marina dock, hair blown across her mouth, one hand holding Camille’s tiny fingers, the scarf bright against a white sweater.
‘Mrs. Vale gave this to me after I signed the letter,’ Marisol said. ‘She said to throw it in the river. I didn’t. I don’t know why.’
Camille took the key. The metal was cold from Marisol’s pocket.
Marisol leaned closer. ‘There is another letter. Not the clinic one. An old one. Helena made me copy it because the ink was fading and she wanted to know what it said. It was addressed to you.’
Camille’s mouth went dry. ‘From my grandmother?’
Marisol shook her head.
‘From your mother.’
The hallway seemed to tilt.
For seven years after Elise died, Camille had slept with the blue scarf under her pillow until Helena threw it away during a spring cleaning. She remembered screaming. Helena remembered telling Daniel that Camille was becoming obsessive.
‘Where is it?’ Camille asked.
Marisol looked toward the elevators. ‘Helena kept the original. I only saw part of it. Your mother wrote that if anything happened to her, Leona should check the back stairwell and the insurance papers. She wrote that she was afraid of Helena.’
Camille gripped the brass key until its teeth bit into her palm.
Mr. Sutter stepped closer, his face grave. ‘Miss Camille,’ he said softly, ‘your grandmother had a second firebox. Not at the cottage. At the old bait freezer under the marina office. She told me if this key ever came back, I was to take you there.’
By late afternoon, the rain had stopped, but the sky remained low and bruised. Camille rode with Mr. Sutter to Bellweather Cove in his truck. Neither spoke much. The windshield wipers clicked even after the glass was clear, a nervous
